This may be the baddest ass rubric I have ever used with real classroom behavior teeth in it. I think it is. Man am I thankful that jen took those other wonderful rubrics and simplified them. I just am too lazy to do any more work than she describes in assessing the level at which each kid […]
This is a cautionary tale for new teachers: I wish I had the 37 years in my classroom back. Every time a kid crossed me, whether I showed it or not, part of me, a slice of my internal fabric, maybe 10%, was afraid. I didn’t want to make the kid angry and cause a
We have been dancing around the AP question for years. This question from Darcy is truly unique in that she is inheriting only CI kids in an established program, as she replaces a successful TPRS/CI teacher who left the school: Hey Ben: The situation at my school is a little different than other AP programs,
I hope the regional War Rooms idea takes flight. There are just too many people on this PLC who can’t get to national conferences. I guess each region will react to the possibilities in its own way (let me know if you want a group added to the list of War Room groups in the
Our discussion of the very most important jobs in our comprehension based classrooms continues. Without the three listed below, my anchors, I wouldn’t even want to start a story: Story Writer – Along with the Quiz Writer, this is the most important job of all. This student has to be a superstar. Their job is simple – all
Here is another excellent article from Mary Beth: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/storytelling-in-the-classroom-matters-matthew-friday
Mary Beth sent this: Hi Ben: This falls into the thread that was going on about SLOW. It is a rare video of Helen Keller with her teacher Anne sullivan. Anne is explaining how she taught Helen, and what struck me the most was her patience and her slowness. Just a reminder to US that
I got this question this morning: Hi Ben – I’m new to TPRS. In the fall I will be teaching Spanish K-5 and would like to incorporate TPRS/CI. The classes meet once a week. This is a new school and position for me and I have full reign to build the elementary Spanish program. So
The big new thing at the 2014 Denver and Chicago conferences was the interactive whiteboard app called Educreations. Interactive whiteboards electronically capture your voice and handwriting to bring to life just-completed stories in your comprehensible input classes. Students can use the iPad to visually recreate stories in much the same way that the classroom artists
John Piazza has compiled a list of take-aways from his experiences at IFLT 2014 in Denver. He said: …I tried to limit this to specific strategies that I will implement or keep in mind as I prep and begin the new school year. I hope it will help other teachers as well. There are too
There is a War Room Group in Portland of one. It’s a start! Darcy Soto sotodarcy@gmail.com
This report from James is from 2013 but bears repeating as we enter another year knowing that a key ingredient of our instruction this year will center around students jobs: When I first started around the PLC there was a lot of talk about student jobs and how great they were for student discipline. They
